Student March Against AIDS 
On February 26, 2005 more than 4,000 students and young people from across the country converged on Washington, DC for the Student March Against AIDS organized by the Student Global AIDS Campaign (SGAC) in partnership with Africa Action and Advocates for Youth. Rallying first at the White House and then marching two miles up Constitution Avenue to a closing rally at the Capitol, student marchers could be heard chanting from blocks away as traffic was halted and tourists flocked to the streets to see what was going on. The second largest AIDS demonstration in U.S. history and the largest in 10 years, the Student March Against AIDS has been widely hailed as the birth of a powerful student AIDS movement - a turning point in the fight against AIDS. It also marked the arrival of a global youth movement with 18 countries participating in a global day of youth action to end AIDS, the first of its kind. Youth AIDS Day The Student Global AIDS Campaign helped to coordinate a Global Day of Action as part of the Global Youth Coalition on HIV/AIDS (GYCA), in association with the Student March Against AIDS. Events took place in Bangladesh, Cameroon, Canada, Egypt, Ghana, Guyana, India, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Uganda, Tanzania, United Kingdom, the United States, and Zambia. The events varied from mass marches to HIV/AIDS testing and counseling, and from letter writing campaigns to awareness seminars. In Mansoura Egypt, the Mansoura Scientific Student Association held a seminar discussion on how AIDS affects women and girls. In Jaipur, India, representatives from various NGOs and youth leaders meet to discuss the mobilization of youths against AIDS in the state of Rajasthan; they drafted a memorandum to send to the State government detailing the current situation and the way forward on HIV/AIDS.
Youth AIDS Day marked the launch of a global movement of youth committed to seeing an end to AIDS and committed to being at the forefront of making that happen. Annual Conference and Lobby Day The Student Campaign for Child Survival held their The Third Annual National Conference and lobby day in Washington, DC February 14-16. The conference was brimming with speakers’ insights (including Ronald Waldman, Deputy Director of the Center for Global Justice Health and Economic Development at the Mailman School of Public Health or Columbia University and Anthony Lake, Vice President for Public Policy, US Fund to UNICEF), lectures, and media/advocacy training. Workshops ranged in topic from UNICEF and the Millennium Development goals to debt cancellation and the domestic children’s issues. Students not only learned basic information on the current status of child survival, but also the nuances of dealing with the various interrelated issues of which it is comprised. They also interacted with several panelists representing the Children’s Defense Fund, RESULTS, Academy for Educational Development, Global Health Council, and UNICEF.
It was with this experience that students expressed their views to around 50 Congressional offices on February 14th as part of the National Lobby Day, demanding 100% multilateral debt cancellation through the Jubilee Act and support for $1.5 billion in funding for the Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria. Students got many positive responses from the office they met with, and were able to prompt one Senator to introduce the Jubilee Act, one Representative to champion the Global Fund, and secure bipartisan support for the CHILD ACT (important legislation increasing funding to the Child and Maternal Health Account). Road to Hope Tour The Student Global AIDS Campaign, in conjunction with Hope’s Voice (national HIV/AIDS organization committed to promoting the education and prevention of HIV/AIDS to young adults) launched the Road To Hope Tour. The tour lasted 5 weeks, launching at George Washington University in Washington DC on April 4, 2005, traveling 5636 miles across country in an RV, visiting 22 schools along the way and ending in San Francisco, CA. Each stop featured a program that included a panel of Hope’s Voice speakers talking and answering questions about living with HIV/AIDS, and Student Global AIDS Campaign representatives that informed students on how they can join the fight against HIV/AIDS and start their own chapters of SGAC. The Road to Hope Tour was supported by a coalition of HIV/AIDS service providers, advocacy, and research organizations who joined together in this historic movement to voice their support and unity.
FAIR Network The first national conference of the Generation FAIR Network took place April 1-3 at American University. Youth from over twenty national organizations came together to look past the single-issue strategies they are primarily focused on, and develop a broader vision for a more Fair, Accountable, Interdependent and Responsible U.S. global engagement. Conference organizers were meticulous about balancing classroom time with structured interactive time, creating an energized open space where relationships among participants took shape faster than the cherry blossoms all around us. Participants exhibited a deep appreciation for the unique multi-issue approach to global justice activism, reporting that they had never attended an activist conference with such an innovative or visionary theme. This resoundingly successful youth conference has been a concrete step toward a new model for the broader progressive movement that will restore our power by promoting a more unified multi-issue strategy.
Student Trade Justice Campaign The Student Trade Justice Campaign has created a guide to combating the Central American Free Trade Agreement. This guide hopes to provide a tool for aspiring activists to fight one of the ugliest injustices of our time—the trap of global poverty. It is intended primarily for students, although the information contained is essential not only for activists of all persuasions, but for anyone who feels concerned about the future of our country, our communities, and our world. The guide has two ends: to educate the reader about the Central America Free Trade Agreement and its projected effects, and to convey the urgency of changing (or redirecting) our current trade path, which is embodied in agreements such as CAFTA.
Global Justice ZambiaThe Global Justice Zambia office was founded by John Phiri after spending three months interning at the Global Justice office in Washington DC. The office was officially opened in October 2003 though the support of Africare. The office works to educate and mobilize young people in the community to take steps to fight against HIV/AIDS. The idea behind GJ Zambia is that "the fight against this global injustice needed to be fought on two fronts- in Africa where the problems are felt, and in America where the problems often originate." |